The Aussie dollar rose in the Asian session after getting support from stronger Australian jobs data and China's move to curb its currency's fall.
A report released on Thursday morning showed Australian jobs beat expectations for the second month in a row in June, rising by 32,600 against forecasts for an increase of just 15,000.
Further reinforcing the indication that Australia's labor market is strong, is the unemployment rate which remained at a record low of 3.5%, missing expectations for an increase of 3.6%.
As a result, it supports the chance for the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to continue to implement an increase in interest rates.
If next week's Australian inflation data shows consumer prices remain strong, then there is little to stop the central bank from continuing to tighten.
This in turn pushed the Aussie dollar to jump almost 1% against the US dollar to trade firmly at 0.6837, at the time of writing.
Also dragging it along, was the New Zealand dollar which also showed an increase of around 0.6% to trade high at around 0.6300 against the greenback.
In Asia, China's central bank (PBOC) has kept its lending benchmark unchanged, with the one-year loan prime rate (LPR) remaining at 3.55% and the five-year LPR at 4.20%.
However, what surprised the market was when it set the yuan's reference rate lower than expected and eased cross-border financing allowing for more foreign capital inflows.
**LPR is the benchmark interest rate used in China, set by the PBOC every month. Serves as a reference rate for banks when determining interest rates for loans (especially new ones) issued to their customers.
